The Upper Mississippi River Basin:Life, Worship, Sports, Transportation, Golf, Politics and other bizarre behaviors in the Upper Mississippi River Basin. The Quincy area has a history of tolerance. We seem to suffer fools gladly.

Thursday, September 13, 2007

CELEBRITY LAWYERS: DEFYING EXPLANATION

Gerry Spence, Melvin Belli, Barry Scheck. Those are easy to understand. Billy Martin, I just don't get. Last three outings:

Told a jury he would show Scooter was set up by the Evil Empire then put on the "bad memory" defense and didn't put The Scoot on the stand. Good-bye Scooter law license and Hello Executive Clemency.

Told the WORLD Michael Vick couldn't wait to prove his innocence of the conspiracy charges related to dog-fighting. Trotted MV's MOTHER out to show how sincerely we all believed in MV's innocence, then jumped him in and, worse in the culture, turned him into a snitch.

What is there about that gives Ol' Lare confidence that he wants to get into a Minnesota trial with Billy at his side on likely a more serious charge and open the door to a possible long line of foot-tapees to testify that they've had porcelain encounters with The Gentleman from Spud Country.

I think this may be the best politico-philosphical-tactical question I have ever been asked on t his blog.

The simple answer is that I never have but that's kind of incomplete.

As long as the candidate didn't put his sexual preference into issue, I would never out him/her, ever. I doubt if I would even if the person took the position that that homosexuality was an abomination to the spirit and biblically condemned. Maybe....and I haven't completely thought this through...if the opposing candidate falsely accused my candidate of being gay when I knew the opposing candidate was, himself, gay, I would do it. That would be a hypocrisy issue. This scenario would depend on a lot of other metric things. The one thing of which I am certain is the other side would have to raise sexuality first.

If you take the trouble to look at my opponent-centered direct mailings over the years (ones I signed and ones I composed), you will see they always relate to an issue or public statement raised by the opponent. Sometimes I blend in subtopics, but the beginning point is something that the opponent raised.

Even for public figures, I believe everybody deserves a modicum of personal privacy, especially when it comes to intimate relations.

Besides, I don't see being gay as a disqualifier. In my former blog site, I wrote rather extensively about gay guys with whom I served in the military and how little it mattered in their performance. Unless a closet gay is gonna denounce gayness, I see it as a non-issue. It's kind of funny but I may be the least homophobic heterosexual male on the planet while my father and brother were tied for the most. Don't know where my attitude came from but it's mine.

"If you take the trouble to look at my opponent-centered direct mailings over the years (ones I signed and ones I composed), you will see they always relate to an issue or public statement raised by the opponent."

Which issue or public statement did that dude that ran against Grussenmeier last time he ran raise that prompted your letter to voters in that ward?

Not looking for a gotcha, actually surprised at your answer to the "outing" question.

You opened the door with the "relate to an issue or public statement raised by the opponent" statement.

I'm not familiar with the complete body of your work. That letter, however, is an example of why a lot of people stay out of politics. The "winner" turns around and quits and gets a 60k+/yr ghost job with the city.

It is unfortunate but, politics even on the local level, is a rough game and not for those with weak stomachs or too many skeletons in their closet.

...I have no evidence that the target of the letter is gay, bi or any other religion. I do remember he had a wife who wrote a letter to the Whig explaining the false accusations though. She could have been a beard, but I have no evidence of that either.

Sure, I see that I opened the door. One of the downsides of not piercing IP addresses is that I really don't know who's writing me. If you were pure of heart, great.

I have to ask, do you know me in the RW? If you do, my answer to your general question shouldn't have surprised you. I have exercised forebearance on a number of personal issues that would have hurt families of opponents over the years. In local elections, my attitude is we all have to live here. Particularly when it comes to addictions or substance abuse, I don't go there. Divorces, don't there, even where testimony in the divorce relates directly to job qualifications. It's just too personal.

I'm surprised you're surprised. Most of my direct mailing career has been simply repeating self-inflicted damage done by the opposing candidate himself/herself.

And when I send a letter that is solely my own undertaking, as that one was, I end it with the following legend. "This letter has been neither printed nor posted at government expense. It has not been reviewedor approved by any political committee, and is the sole, personal undertaking of Anthony B. Cameron."